When he said that every evil troubling us, even the rate of interest and I know not what else, was based on the uncertainty of our conditions, and when he quoted the word of a colleague of a "hopeless confusion"--well, gentlemen, then I must repeat what I have said elsewhere and in the hearing of the Honorable Mr. Richter: Make a comparison and look about you in other countries! If our conditions with their ordered activities and their a.s.sured future at home and abroad const.i.tute a "hopeless confusion," how shall we characterize the conditions of many another country? I can see in no European country a condition of safety and an a.s.sured outlook into the future similar to that prevailing in the German empire. I have already said on the former occasion that my position as minister of foreign affairs made it impossible for me to be specific. But everyone who will follow my remarks with a map in his hand, and a knowledge of history during the past twenty years, will have to say that I am right. I do not know what is the use of these exaggerations of a "hopeless confusion" and "a lack of a.s.surance and uncertainty of the future." n.o.body in the country believes it; and isn"t that the chief thing? The people in the country know perfectly well how they are off, and all who do not fare as they wish are pleased to blame the government for it. When a candidate comes up for election, and says to them: "The government--or to quote the previous speaker--the chancellor is to blame for all this," he may find many credulous people, but in the majority he will find people who will say: "The chancellor surely has his faults and drawbacks"--but most people will not be convinced that I am to blame for everything. I am faring in this respect like Emperor Napoleon twelve years and more ago, who was accused, not in his own country but in Europe, as the cause of all evils, from Tartary to Spain, and he was not nearly so bad a creature as he was said to be--may I not also claim the benefit of this doubt with Mr. Richter? I, too, am not so bad as I am painted. His attack upon me, moreover, if he will stop to reflect, is largely directed not against me personally, or against that part of my activities in which I possess freedom of action, no--it is directed primarily against the const.i.tution of the German empire. The const.i.tution of the German empire knows no other responsible officer but the chancellor. I might a.s.sert that my const.i.tutional responsibility does not go nearly so far as the one actually placed upon me; and I might take things a little easier and say: "I have nothing to do with the home policies of the empire, for I am only the emperor"s executive officer." But I will not do this. From the beginning I have a.s.sumed the responsibility, and also the obligation, of defending the decisions of the Bundesrat, provided I can reconcile them with my responsibility, even if I find myself there in the minority. This responsibility I will take as public opinion understands it. n.o.body, however, can be held responsible for acts and resolves not his own. No responsibility can be foisted on anybody--nor did the imperial const.i.tution intend to do this--for acts which do not depend on his own free will, and into which he can be forced. The responsible person, therefore, must enjoy complete independence and freedom within the sphere of his responsibility. If he does not, all responsibility ceases; and _I_ do not know on whose shoulders it will rest--so far as the empire is concerned it has disappeared completely.
As long, therefore, as Mr. Richter does not change the const.i.tution, you yourselves must insist on having a chancellor who is absolutely free and independent in his decisions, for no man can hold him responsible for those things which he is unable to decide for himself, freely and independently. Mr. Richter has expressed the wish of limiting in several directions this const.i.tutional independence of the chancellor. In the first place, in one direction where it is already limited and where he wishes to have it disappear entirely. This concerns his responsibility for those acts in our political life which the const.i.tution a.s.signs to the emperor in connection with the decisions of the Bundesrat and the Reichstag. There can be no doubt that these acts include also those which have to be performed, as the const.i.tution says, in the name of the emperor; the submission, for instance, to the Reichstag of a resolve of the Bundesrat. Mr. Richter has correctly quoted an incident, mentioned in the _North German Gazette_, concerning the resolves on some collected cases of accidents, which I considered it incompatible with my responsibility to submit to you in the name of the emperor. I, therefore, did not do it. One may well ask: What has the const.i.tutional law to say on this point? Was I justified in not acting? Was the emperor justified in not acting! Or was His Majesty the Emperor bound by the const.i.tution to submit to you the resolve of the Bundesrat?
At the time when the const.i.tution was being drawn I once discussed this point with an astute jurist, who had long been and still is with us in an important position--Mr. Pape. He said to me: "The emperor has no veto." I replied, "Const.i.tutionally he has not, but suppose a measure is expected of him which he thinks he should not take, and against which his then chancellor warns him, saying: I cannot advocate it, and I shall not countersign it. Well, in this case is the emperor obliged to look for another chancellor, and to dismiss him who opposes the measure? Is he obliged to accept anyone as chancellor, suggested perhaps by the other party? Will he look for a second or third chancellor, both of whom may say: We cannot a.s.sume the responsibility for this bill by submitting it to the Reichstag?" Hereupon Mr. Pape replied: "You are right, the emperor possesses an indirect but actual veto."
I do not even go so far, for none of these cases are pressed to their logical conclusion. Let us, however, take a concrete case, which will make these matters perfectly clear. Suppose the majority of the Bundesrat had pa.s.sed a bill with the approval of Prussia, but Prussia had made the mistake of not calling upon the Prussian minister designated to instruct the Prussian delegation in the Bundesrat; or even--Prussia had consented and the minister had been present, and had been in the minority also in the Prussian cabinet, and the emperor had directed him to submit the resolves of the Bundesrat to the Reichstag, to which the chancellor had replied: "I do not believe that I can answer for this, or that my responsibility permits me to do it." Then there results the possibility of the emperor"s saying: "If that is so, I must look for another chancellor." This did not happen; another thing happened, namely--the resolve was not submitted. The ensuing situation is this, that the persons ent.i.tled to complain--if there are any--const.i.tute the majority of the governments who pa.s.sed this resolve in the Bundesrat.
This points the proper way, and I believe in weighty questions it would be taken to the end. In the present case if one were to make a test of what is really right, the majority of the Bundesrat would have to represent to His Majesty as follows: "We have pa.s.sed a resolve, and our const.i.tutional right demands that the emperor submit it to the Reichstag. We demand that this be done." The emperor might reply: "I will not investigate the law of the case to see whether I am obliged to act. I will a.s.sume that I am, and I do not refuse to act, but for the present I have no chancellor willing to countersign the order." In such a case can the chancellor be ordered to sign, because he shall and must do so? Can he be threatened with imprisonment as is done with recalcitrant witnesses? What would then become of his responsibility!
If the chancellor continues to refuse, the majority of the Bundesrat may say to the emperor: "You must dismiss this chancellor and get another. We insist that our resolve be laid before the Reichstag. If this is not done, the const.i.tution will be broken." Well, gentlemen, why not wait and see whether this will happen, and whether those ent.i.tled to complain will take this course, and if they do, whether His Majesty the Emperor will not be ready to say after all: "All right, I shall try to find a chancellor who is willing to submit the resolve."
I shall, of course, not enter here upon a discussion of the reasons which determined me in this concrete case. They were reasons not found in shut-in offices, but in G.o.d"s open country, and they induced me to deem the enactment of this law undesirable. I did not possess the certainty that a majority of this house would have seen the impossibility of carrying out the law, but I did not wish to expose the country to the danger--it was a danger according to my way of thinking--of getting this law. The only moment when I could guard against this danger was when the law was to be submitted in the name of the emperor. The const.i.tutional remedy against such a use of an opportunity is a change of chancellors. I can see no other remedy.
Mentioning the Reichstag brings me to my cooperation with it. Mr.
Richter"s ideal is, it seems to me, a bashful, cautious chancellor who throws out careful feelers whether he may offend here, if he does this, or offend there--one who does not wait for a final vote of the Reichstag, but rushes home excitedly, as I have often seen my colleagues do, exclaiming: "Oh G.o.d, the law is lost, this man and that man are opposed to it"--and three weeks later the law has Pa.s.sed in spite of them. I cannot enter upon such a policy of conjecture and proof by inference of what may be determined in the Reichstag when the tendency of those who talk the loudest, but who are not always the most influential, happens to be against a bill; and if Mr. Richter should succeed in procuring such a timid chancellor anxiously listening for every hint, my advice to you, gentlemen, is to tolerate him in this position as briefly as possible. For if a leading minister--and such he is in the empire--has no opinion his own, and must hear from others what he should believe and do, then you do not need him at all. What Mr. Richter proposes is the government of the State by the Reichstag, the government of the State by itself, as it has been called in France, by its own chosen representatives. A chancellor, a minister who does not dare to submit a bill of the ultimate success of which he is not absolutely sure is no minister. He might as well move among you with the white sign (of a page) inquiring whether you will permit him to submit this or that. For such a part I am not made!
To what extent I am ready to submit to the Bundesrat I have already tried to explain, and I have closed with these words "_sub judice lis est_" (the case is still in court). I need not say now whether my const.i.tutional conviction would make me yield to the majority of the Bundesrat, if they should demand it. This question has not yet arisen; the majority has not demanded it. Whether I shall maintain my opposition, if the demand is pressed, to this question I reply: _non liquet_ (it is a moot-point); we shall see what happens. Such things are eventually decided by the old law which the Romans were astonished to find with the Germans, and of which they said, "They call it usage." Such a usage has not yet developed in connection with the interpretation of our const.i.tution.
Finally, Mr. Richter has found in me too much independence in a third direction. He has been pleased to believe--if I understood him correctly--that the law concerning ministerial deputies would give me the welcome opportunity of withdrawing to a more ornamental position, to use his own expression, and to leave the duties and activities to those who are deputed to represent me, establishing thus also in the imperial government the famous arcanum of decisions by majorities. But here, too, I must say that Mr. Richter will have to change the const.i.tution before I shall be able to subordinate myself to the highest officials of the empire. How can I appear before you saying: "Well, gentlemen, I am very doubtful whether I can advocate this measure, but the secretary in whose bureau it was worked out thinks so, and following Mr. Richter"s advice I have yielded to his authority. If you do not adopt this measure you will gratify me, but not the secretary?" This, too, would be an altogether impossible position, although Mr. Richter is expecting it of me.
The chiefs of the bureaus are not responsible for me, except in so far as the law of deputies subst.i.tutes them for me but I am responsible for their actions. I have to guarantee that they are statesmen in general accord with the policy of the empire which I am willing to advocate. If I miss this accord in one of them, not once but continually and on principle, then it is my duty to tell him: "We cannot remain in office, both of us." This, too, is a task which I have never shirked when it has presented itself. It is simply my duty.
I have never had need of such artful machinations and pyrotechnics as people claimed I inst.i.tuted very wilfully last week. You need not think that ministers stick to their posts like many other high officials, whom not even the broadest hints can convince that their time has come. I have not yet found a minister in these days who had not to be persuaded every now and then to continue a little longer in office, and not to be discouraged by his hard and exhausting labor, due to the simultaneous friction with three parliamentary bodies--a House of Representatives, a House of Lords, and a Reichstag--where one relieves another, or two, without waiting to be relieved, are in session at the same time. And when the fight is over and the representatives have returned home well satisfied, then a bureau chief comes to the minister on the day after, saying: "It is time now to get the recommendations for the next session into shape."
The whole business, moreover, while very honorable, is scarcely pleasurable. Is any one obliged to submit to such public, sharp and impolite criticisms as a German minister? Is it true of anyone but him that the behavior customary among people of culture does not prevail when he addressed? Without the least scruple one says things to him publicly which one would be ashamed to say to him privately, if one were to meet him in a drawing-room, for instance. I should not say this here if the Reichstag did not hold an exceptional position in Germany in these matters as well as in everything else. Here I have never had to hear, so far as I remember, as sharp remarks as in other a.s.semblies. At any rate I have a conciliatory memory. But on the whole you will agree with me that the tone of our public debates is less elevated than that of our social gatherings, especially when our ministers are addressed, but at times even among fellow members, although of this I am no competent critic. I do not even criticize the behavior toward the ministers, for I am hardened by an experience of many years and can stand it. I am merely describing the reasons why no minister clings to his post, and why you do me an injustice if you believe that it takes an artful effort to make a minister yield his place. Not many of them have been accustomed to see a totally ignorant correspondent tear an experienced minister to pieces in the press as if he were a stupid schoolboy. We see this in every newspaper every day, but we can stand it. We do not complain. But can anyone say that the members of the government--the bureau chiefs frequently fare even worse--meet in the parliamentary debates with that urbaneness of demeanor which characterizes our best society? I do not say "no,"
leaving it to you to answer this question. I only say that the business of being a minister is very arduous and cheerless, subject to vexations and decidedly exhausting. This brings it about that the ministers are habitually in a mood which makes them readily give up their places as soon as they have found another excuse than the simple: I have had enough, I do not care for more, I am tired of it.
The changes of ministers, however, have not been so many nor so quick with us as they are in other countries, and this I may mention to Mr.
Richter as a proof of my amiability as a colleague. Count, if you will, the number of ministers who have crossed the public stage since I entered office in 1862, and sum up the resignations due to other than parliamentary reasons, and you will find a result exceedingly favorable to the accommodating spirit of the German minister when it is compared with that of any other country. I consider, therefore, the insinuating references to my quarrelsome disposition and fickleness distinctly wide of the mark.
In this connection I shall take the liberty of referring with one more word to the reproaches, often occurring in the press and also in the Reichstag, that I had frequently and abruptly changed my views. Well, I am not one of those who at any time of their life have believed, or believe today, that they can learn no more. If a man says to me: "Twenty years ago you held the same opinion as I; I still hold it, but you have changed your views," I reply: "You see, I was as clever twenty years ago as you are today. Today I know more, I have learned things in these twenty years." But, gentlemen, I will not even rely on the justice of the remark that the man who does not learn also fails to progress and cannot keep abreast of his time. People are falling behind when they remain rooted in the position they occupied years ago. However, I do not at all intend to excuse myself with such observations, for _I have always had one compa.s.s only, one lode-star by which I have steered: Salus Publica, the welfare of the State_.
Possibly I have often acted rashly and hastily since I first began my career, but whenever I had time to think I have always acted according to the question, "What is useful, advantageous, and right for my fatherland, and--as long as this was only Prussia--for my dynasty, and today--for the German nation?" I have never been a theorist. The systems which bin and separate parties are for me of secondary importance. The nation comes first, its position in the world and its independence, and above all our organization along lines inch will make it possible for us to draw the free breath of a great nation.
Everything else, a liberal, reactionary, or conservative const.i.tution--gentlemen, I freely confess, all this I consider in second place. It is the luxury of furnishing the house, when the house is firmly established. In the interest of the country I can parley now with one person, now with another in purely party questions. Theories I barter away cheaply. First let us build a structure secure on the outside and firmly knit on the inside, and protected by the ties of a national union. After that, when you ask my advice about furnishing the house with more or less liberal const.i.tutional fittings, you may perhaps hear me say, "Ah well, I have no preconceived ideas. Make your suggestions, and, when the sovereign whom I serve agrees, you will find no objections on principle on my part." It can be done thus, and again thus. There are many roads leading to Rome. There are times when one should govern liberally, and times when one should govern autocratically. Everything changes. Nothing is eternal in these matters. But of the structure of the German empire and the union of the German nation I demand that they be free and una.s.sailable, with not only a pa.s.sing field fortification on one side. I have given to its creation and growth my entire strength from the very beginning.
And if you point to a single moment when I have not steered by this direction of the compa.s.s-needle, you may perhaps prove that I have erred, but you cannot prove that I have for one moment lost sight of the national goal.
[Ill.u.s.tration: PRINCE BISMARCK FRANZ VON LENBACH]
PRACTICAL CHRISTIANITY
April 2, 1881
TRANSLATED BY EDMUND VON MACH, PH.D.
[Prince Bismarck was trying to fight the revolutionary parties, not only with such restrictive laws as had been pa.s.sed against the Socialists, but also with constructive measures like the one which had been submitted to the Reichstag on March 8, 1881. It proposed the insurance of the workingman against accidents, and the founding of a governmental insurance company. The bill was severely criticized, notably by Eugen Richter, who did not miss the opportunity of attacking also the chancellor personally. Prince Bismarck"s reply made a deep impression in the country at large. The bill itself, however, was so badly amended in the Reichstag, that Bismarck urged the Bundesrat to reject it, which it did. Several changes, thereupon, were made in the bill, and, after having been delayed in committee, it was again brought up for discussion in 1884, when another exhaustive speech by the chancellor, on March 15, brought about its acceptance.]
Before turning to the subject in hand, I wish to reply to some remarks of the previous speaker, lest I forget them--they are of so little weight. He finished by saying that my prestige was waning. If he were right, I should feel like saying "Thank G.o.d," for prestige is a very burdensome affair. One suffers under its weight, and quickly gets tired of it. I do not care a farthing for it. When I was very much younger, about as old as the previous speaker is now, and when I was possibly still more ambitious than he, I lived for years without prestige, and was actually disliked, if not hated, by the majority of my fellow-citizens. At that time I felt better and more contented, and was healthier than during the years when I was most popular.
Such things do not mean much to me. I am doing my duty, let come what may.
As proof of his a.s.sertion the previous speaker claimed that the workingmen are refusing the help which the Imperial Government is trying to offer them. This he cannot possibly know. He has no idea of what the great ma.s.s of the workingmen are thinking. Probably he has some accurate information of what the eloquent place-hunters are thinking of the bill, people who are at the head of the labor movements, and the professional publicists, who need a following of workingmen--dissatisfied workingmen. But as to the workingman in general, we had better wait and see what he is thinking. I do not know whether the full meaning of this question has even yet sufficiently penetrated into his circles to make it a subject of discussion, except in the learned clubs of laborers, and among the leading place-hunters and speakers. In the next election we shall be able to tell whether the workingmen have formed their opinion of the bill by then, not to speak of now.
The legislation on which we are entering with this bill has to do with a question which will probably stay on your calendar for a long while.
The previous speaker has correctly said that "it opens up a very deep perspective," and it is not at all impossible that it may also make the moderate Socialists judge more kindly of the government. We have been talking of a social question for fifty years; and, since the pa.s.sage of the law against the Socialists, I have been constantly reminded, officially, from high quarters, and by the people, that we gave a promise at that time. Something positive should be done to remove the causes for Socialism, in so far as they are legitimate. _I_ have received such reminders daily. Nor do I believe that this social question, which has been before us for fifty years now, will be definitely settled even by our children and children"s children. No political question ever reaches so complete a mathematical solution that the books can be balanced. Such questions arise, abide a while and finally give way to other historical problems. This is the way of organic developments.
I deem it my duty to take up this question quietly and without party vehemence, because I do not know who else could do this successfully if not the Imperial Government. It is a pity that party questions should be mixed up in it. The previous speaker has referred to a supposedly active exchange of telegrams between "certain parties" and "an high official," which in this case, I must believe, means me. I am mentioning this, in pa.s.sing, because he said the same thing a few days ago in another speech. Gentlemen, this is a very simple matter. I receive thousands of telegrams; and, being a polite man, I should probably reply also to a telegram from Mr. Richter, if he were to honor me with a friendly despatch. When I am cordially addressed in a message, I have to reply in cordial terms. I cannot possibly have the police ascertain to what party the senders belong. Nor am I so diffident in my views that I should wish to catechize the senders as to their political affiliations. If anybody takes pleasure in making me appear to be a member of anti-semitic societies, let him do so. I have kept away from all undesirable movements, as my position demands, and I could wish that also you gentlemen would refrain more than heretofore from inciting the cla.s.ses against each other, and from oratorical phrases which fan cla.s.s-hatred. This refers especially to those gentlemen who have bestowed their kind attention upon the Government and upon me personally. When we heard the representative, Mr. Lasker, say the other day that the policy of the government was aristocratic, this term was bound to render the whole aristocracy and what belongs to it suspected of selfishness in the eyes of the poor men, at whose expense the aristocracy seemingly exists. When such expressions fall on anti-semitic ground, how is it possible to avoid reprisals? The anti-semites will coin their own word with which to designate--as they think appropriately--the policies opposed to ours.
The resulting epithet I do not care to mention; every one will think of it himself. When afterwards a newspaper like the _Tribune_, which is said to be owned by Mr. Bamberger, makes itself the mouthpiece of Mr. Lasker"s expression, claiming it to be correct, and hailing the invention of this word as a discovery worthy of Columbus, and when the _Tribune_ finally a.s.serts that "care for the poor" and "aristocracy"
cannot exist in the same train of thought, can you not imagine what will happen when all this is turned around, and altered by an anti-semite? Are you in doubt what he will subst.i.tute for "aristocracy," and do you not know that he will repeat every twist and turn of speech with which Mr. Bamberger"s sheet imputes selfish injustice to the aristocracy?
The representative Mr. Richter has called attention to the responsibility of the State for everything it does in the field on which it is entering today. Well, gentlemen, I feel that the State may become responsible also for the things it does _not_ do. I do not believe that the "_laissez faire, laissez aller_, theory," and the unadulterated political theories of Manchester, such as "let each one do what he chooses, and fare as he will," or "who is not strong enough to stand, let him be crushed," or "he who has will receive more, and he who has not from him let us take," can be practised in any State, least of all in a monarchical State, governed by the father of his country. On the contrary, I believe that those who shudder at the State exerting its influence for the protection of the weaker brethren, themselves intend to capitalize their strength--be it financial, rhetorical, or what not--that they may gain a following, or oppress the rest, or smooth their own way to party control. They become angry, of course, as soon as their plans are spoiled by the rising influence of the State.
The representative Mr. Richter says this legislation does not go far enough. If he will have patience, we may perhaps be able to satisfy him a little later--one should not be hasty or try to do everything at once! Such laws are not made arbitrarily out of theories and as the result of asking "what kind of law would it be wise to make now?"
They are the gradual outgrowth of earlier events. The reason why we come to you today only with an accident-insurance law is because this branch of the care of the poor and the weak was especially vigorous even before I seriously concerned myself with such matters. Bequests, suggestions, and notes for such a bill were on file when I a.s.sumed office. According to the records this bill was needed more than any other. When I began to study it, I must confess that it did not seem to me to go far enough in theory, and that I was tempted to change the words which occur, I believe in the first paragraph, "every workingman who" and "shall be reimbursed in such and such a way," to read, "every German." There is something ideal in this change. If one thinks of it more seriously, however, and especially if one plans to include also the independent workmen, who meet with an accident at no one"s behest but their own, the question of insurance is even more difficult. No two hours" speech of any representative can give us so much concern as this problem has given us: "How far is it possible to extend this law without creating at the very start an unfavorable condition, or reaching out too far and thus overreaching ourselves?" As a farmer I was tempted to ask, whether it would be possible to extend the insurance, for instance, also to the farmhands, who const.i.tute the majority of the workingmen in our eastern provinces. I shall not give up hope that this may be possible, but there are difficulties, which for the time being have prevented us from doing this; and concerning these I wish to say a few words.
The farming industry, in so far as it has to do with machinery and elemental forces, is, of course, not excluded from the law. But the remaining great majority of the country population also comes in frequent contact with machines, although these are set in motion not by elemental forces, but by horses or fellow-laborers. Such occupations are often dangerous and unwholesome, but it is exceedingly difficult to gather statistics and percentages, and to define the necessary amount of contributions to an insurance fund.
The representative Mr. Richter knows, apparently from experience, the proper percentage in every branch of human occupation, for he has quoted his figures with much a.s.surance. I should be grateful to him if he would mention also the source of his valuable information. We have done the best we could. The preliminary drafts of the bill were based on carefully selected facts--notice please, selected facts, and not arbitrary statistics based on conjecture. If we had discovered those figures, which the quicker eye of the honorable Mr. Richter seems to have detected at a glance, and if we had believed them to be accurate, we should have gone further in this bill.
When I say that I do not give up hope that the farming industry may yet be included, I am thinking of an organization which cannot be created at one session of the Reichstag. Like the child which must be small if it is to be born at all, and which gradually a.s.sumes its proper proportions by growth, so also this organization will have to develop gradually. Eventually the various branches of industry which have insured their laborers should be formed into incorporated a.s.sociations, and each a.s.sociation should raise among its own members the premiums needed for the proper insurance of its laborers. It should at the same time exercise supervision over its members to the extent that the dues should be as low as possible. Or, to put it differently, the personal interest of the contributing members should see to it that adequate means for the prevention of accidents are adopted. If this can be accomplished by a gradual advance based on experience, we may also hope to find, by experience, the proper percentage as regards that branch of farming which does not employ elemental forces.
Our lack of experience in these matters has also induced us to be very careful about the a.s.sessment of the necessary contributions. I certainly should not have the courage to press this bill if the expenses which it entails were to be borne exclusively by the various industries. If the a.s.sistance which the State would render--either by provincial or county a.s.sociations, or directly--were to be entirely omitted, I should not dare to answer to our industries for the consequences of this law. Perhaps this can be done, and after a few years of experience we may be able to judge whether it is possible.
The State contribution, therefore, may be limited at first to three years, or to whatever period you wish. But without any actual experience, without any practical test of what we are to expect, I do not dare to burden our industries with all the expenses of this government-inst.i.tution, and to add to their taxes. I do not dare to place upon them the whole burden of caring for the injured factory or mill hands. The county a.s.sociations used to do this, and in the future it will be done more fully and in a more dignified way by the insurers and the State.
No entirely new charges are here contemplated; the charges are merely transferred from the county a.s.sociations to the State. I do not deny that the tax of him who pays and the advantages which accrue to the laborer will be increased. The increase, however, does not equal the full third which the State is to bear, but only the difference between what at present the county a.s.sociations are obliged to do for the injured workingmen, and what these men will receive in future. You see, it is purely a question of improving the lot of the laboring man.
This difference, therefore, is the only new charge on the State, with which you have to reckon. And you will have to ask yourselves: "Is the advantage gained worth this difference,--when we aim to procure for the laborer who has been injured a better and more adequate support, and relieve him of the necessity of having to fight for his right in court, and when he will receive without delay the moderate stipend which the State decrees?" I feel like answering the question with a strong affirmative.
Our present poor laws keep the injured laboring man from starvation.
According to law, at least, n.o.body need starve. Whether in reality this never happens I do not know. But this is not enough in order to let the men look contentedly into the future and to their own old age.
The present bill intends to keep the sense of human dignity alive which even the poorest German should enjoy, if I have my way. He should feel that he is no mere eleemosynary, but that he possesses a fund which is his very own. No one shall have the right to dispose of it, or to take it from him, however poor he may be. This fund will open for him many a door, which otherwise will remain closed to him and it will secure for him better treatment in the house where he has been received, because when he leaves he can take away with him whatever contributions he has been making to the household expenses.
If you have ever personally investigated the conditions of the poor in our large cities, or of the village paupers in the country, you have been able to observe the wretched treatment which the poor occasionally receive even in the best managed communities, especially if they are physically weak or crippled. This happens in the houses of their stepmothers, or relatives of any kind, yes also in those of their nearest of kin. Knowing this, are you not obliged to confess that every healthy laboring man, who sees such things, must say to himself: "Is it not terrible that a man is thus degraded in the house which he used to inhabit as master and that his neighbor"s dog is not worse off than he?" Such things do happen. What protection is there for a poor cripple, who is pushed into a corner, and is not given enough to eat? There is none. But if he has as little as 100 or 200 marks of his own, the people will think twice before they oppress him.
We have been in a position to observe this in the case of the military invalids. Although only five or six dollars are paid every month, this actual cash amounts to something in the household where the poor are boarded, and the thrifty housewife is careful not to offend or to lose the boarder who pays cash.
I, therefore, a.s.sure you that we felt the need of insisting by this law on a treatment of the poor which should be worthy of humanity.
Next year I shall be able fully to satisfy Mr. Richter in regard to the amount and the extent of attention which the State will give to a better and more adequate care of all the unemployed. This will come as a natural consequence, whether or no the present bill is pa.s.sed. Today this bill is a test, as it were. We are sounding to see how deep the waters are, financially, into which we are asking the State and the country to enter. You cannot guard yourselves against such problems by delivering elegant and sonorous speeches, in which you recommend the improvement of our laws of liability, without in the least indicating how this can be done. In this way you cannot settle these questions, for you are acting like the ostrich, who hides his head lest he see his danger. The Government has seen its duty and is facing, calmly and without fear, the dangers which we heard described here a few days ago most eloquently and of which we were given convincing proofs.
We should, however, also remove, as much as possible, the causes which are used to excite the people, and which alone render them susceptible to criminal doctrines. It is immaterial to me whether or no you will call this Socialism. If you call it Socialism, you must have the remarkable wish of placing the Imperial Government, in so far as this bill of the allied governments is concerned, in the range of the very critique which Mr. von Puttkamer pa.s.sed here on the endeavors of the Socialists. It would then almost seem that with this bill only a very small distance separated us from the murderous band of Ha.s.selmann, the incendiary writings of Most, and the revolutionary conspiracies of the Congress of Wyden; and that even this distance would soon disappear.
Well, gentlemen, this is, of course, the very opposite of true. Those who fight with such oratorical and meaningless niceties are counting on the many meanings of the word "socialism." As a result of the kind of programs which the Socialists have issued, this term is, in our public opinion today, almost synonymous with "criminal." If the government endeavors to treat the injured workingmen better in the future, and especially more becomingly, and not to offer to their as yet vigorous brethren the spectacle, as it were, of an old man on the dump heap slowly starving to death, this cannot be called socialistic in the sense in which that murderous band was painted to us the other day. People are playing a cheap game with the shadow on the wall when they call our endeavors socialistic.
If the representative Mr. Bamberger, who took no offense at the word "Christian," wishes to give a name to our endeavors which I could cheerfully accept, let it be: "Practical Christianity," but _sans phrase_, for we shall not pay the people with words and speeches, but with actual improvements. Yet, death alone is had for the asking. If you refuse to reach into your pocketbook, or that of the State, you will not accomplish anything. If you should place the whole burden on the industries, I do not know whether they could bear it. Some might be able to do it, but not all. Those who could do it are the industries where the wages are but a small fraction of the total cost of production. Among such I mention the chemical factories, and the mills which with twenty mill hands can do an annual business of several million marks. The great ma.s.s of laborers, however, does not work in such establishments, which I am tempted to call aristocratic--without wishing to excite any cla.s.s-hatred. They are in industries where the wages amount to 80 or 90 per cent, of the cost of production. Whether the latter can bear the additional burden I do not know.
It is, moreover, perfectly immaterial whether the a.s.sessment is made on the employer or on the employee. In either case the industry will have to bear it, for the contribution of the laborer will eventually, and of necessity, be added to the expenses of the industry. There is a general complaint that the average wages of the laborers make the saving of a surplus impossible. If you wish, therefore, to add a burden to the laborers whose present wages are no more than sufficient, the employers will have to increase the wages, or the laborers will leave them for other occupations.
The previous speaker called the bill defective, because the principle of relieving the laborer from all contributions had not been consistently followed; and he spoke as if this principle had not been at all followed. Laborers, receiving more than 750 marks in three hundred working days, are, it is true, not affected by it; and this is due to the origin of the bill. The first draft read that one-third of the contributions should be made by those county a.s.sociations which would have to support the injured man in conformity with the poor-laws of the State. We did not wish merely to make a gift to these a.s.sociations, which at present are responsible for 80 per cent. of all injured working-men, that is for those who do not come under the law of liability. We, therefore, accepted as just the proposition that these a.s.sociations should pay one-third toward the insurance of those men who formerly would have become their charges. Laborers, however, whose pay is large enough to keep them from becoming public charges, when they meet with an accident, hold an exceptional position. I am, nevertheless, perfectly willing to drop this exception in the bill, as I have said repeatedly. But since the Reichstag in its entirety has thus far placed itself on record as opposed to any contribution from the State, I should not gain thereby any votes for the bill. I wish to declare, however, that this limit of 750 marks is of no consequence compared with the theory on which the bill is based. It arose from a sense of justice toward the county a.s.sociations, which were not to be burdened with higher taxes than would equal their savings under this bill. Later it was discovered from many actual examples that the insurance according to the existing county a.s.sociations was impossible, because the State, which really is responsible for the care of the poor, had distributed it in an arbitrary and unjust way on the various county a.s.sociations. Small and weak country communities are often overburdened with the care of poor people, while large and wealthy communities may have practically no charges, since the geographical position alone has determined the membership in the various county a.s.sociations. The result, therefore, of levying the necessary contributions on these a.s.sociations would have been a very uneven distribution of the a.s.sessments. Being convinced of this, I suggested the subst.i.tution of "provincial a.s.sociation" for "county a.s.sociation"; and thus the bill read for several weeks, until we yielded to the wishes of the allied states and of the Economic Council, and left to each state the question whether it wished to take the place of these various a.s.sociations or preferred to call upon them in any way it chose. These are the steps by which we reached the 750 mark exemption, and the unconditional share which is to be paid by the State. This share is nothing but a hint to the legislature how to distribute the care of the poor to the various county--and other a.s.sociations. Whatever is done, you will agree with me that we need a revision of our poor-laws. Just how this will eventually be accomplished is immaterial to me.
I am not astonished that the most divergent views are held on this new subject, which touches our lives very intimately, and which no experience has as yet illuminated. Because of this divergence of opinion I am also aware that we may be unable to pa.s.s an acceptable law at this session. My own interest in this entire work would be very much lessened if I were to notice that the principle of a State contribution were to be definitely rejected, and that the legislative a.s.sembly of the country were to vote against State-contributions. This would transfer the whole matter to the sphere of open commerce, if I may say so, and in that case it might be better to leave the insurance to private enterprise rather than to establish a State-inst.i.tution without any compulsion. I should certainly not have the courage to exercise compulsion, if the State did not at the same time make a contribution.